


Netted By Strings

by commoncomitatus



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Adjusting/Coping, Drinking, Gen, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-25
Updated: 2020-11-25
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:07:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27712475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/commoncomitatus/pseuds/commoncomitatus
Summary: Post-4x04. Charlie may be out of her cage, but that doesn't mean she feels less trapped.
Relationships: Charlie/Zari Tomaz | Zari Tarazi
Comments: 6
Kudos: 27





	Netted By Strings

**Author's Note:**

> This was actually written back when S5 was still airing. It doesn't explicitly discuss or mention Charlie's origins per se, but the revelations from that season were very much taken into account when writing it. Not sure if that counts as spoilery, but worth mentioning for context.

—

Zari wants her on a short leash.

It might be all right, that, if she meant the fun kind. Studded leather and ropes and handcuffs, the kind that comes with more perks than problems. Wouldn’t mind a bit of that, Charlie, but apparently that’s not what these Legends of Whatever are all about.

It’s the other kind of leashes they like. The kind that’s all binding and boundaries and no fun at all, the kind that’s really just a prison with a fancier name. And when Zari looks her up and down and says to Captain Sara (later, privately, behind her back like the snake she is), “Keep her on a short leash,” what she really means is _‘keep that monster chained up tight.’_

Like she thinks Charlie won’t recognise a cage just because it doesn’t have bars.

Bloody rubbish, is what it is.

Stupid, unfair, senseless bloody rubbish, all of it, and if they think for one second she’s just going to sit there like a good little magical creature while they cuff her and chain her up all stealthy and sneaky-like, they’re in for the shock of their boring little lives.

She’ll die first.

She’ll—

And, wow, okay, that kind of stops her in her tracks. 

Because, yeah, it could actually happen.

The whole ‘dying’ thing, that is. Could actually—

Because it’s real now, innit?

She keeps forgetting that part, impossible as that seems. The human-now part, the mortal-now part, the great-bloody-magical-lobotomy part. She keeps forgetting what they did to her — what he did to her, John frigging Constantine — all in the name of ‘justice’ or ‘fairness’ or some old bint called Amaya.

Then she remembers. Like, smack-in-the-face, bolt-of-lightning-straight-through-the-chest remembers, and she wonders how in the world she could have possibly forgot, because it’s _right bloody there_ and it’s _all the damn time_ , the tick-tick-tick of her stupid, useless mortal heartbeat.

So, yeah. Maybe actually could or would die first, if she had a mind to it.

Or if they did.

Scary thought, that. It’s not something she’s had to worry about since—

Well, ever, to be honest. Not once in all those years. All those millenia.

And now, this.

Stuck. Mortal. Probably dying, tick by tick, every stupid heartbeat another step closer to some shallow little unmarked grave in the middle of nowhere.

Sickening.

No, wait, the other thing: bloody terrifying.

Sickening too, though, kind of.

Because here they are, these so-called ‘Legends’ asking for more.

A short leash, a cage without the bars. And that... it’s just not _on_.

They’ve already lobotomised her, for the love of whatever. Already trapped her in this pathetic excuse for a body, this cage made of flesh and bone and blood. What more could they ask for?

That, apparently.

A great bloody leash, short and tight. Like they think she’s some kind of...

Well. They do, don’t they?

‘Creature’, magical or otherwise. It’s just a nicer word for ‘animal’, innit?

Never made any secret of that, bless ’em.

And she’s supposed to be just fine and dandy with it. _Cheers, mates, for not sending me back to the hell-prison and all that jazz. Jury’s still out on whether this place is any better, but at least you lot have beer._

And whisky.

And gin, vodka, rum, tequila, and that Hooch stuff that Mick Rory loves so much.

So, hey, at least there’s that.

Funny old thing, getting sloshed like this. Stuck in a single body, all weak and mortal and human.

Well, human- _looking_ , anyhow.

Never knew the first thing about Amaya or whoever she was, and now she’s stuck like this forever. The same simpering face, the same arms, legs, tits, arse... and the same piss-poor tolerance for the only stuff that makes this hellish new life worthwhile.

Comparatively speaking, anyhow.

She could still drink most mortals under the table, easy enough — that’s just how she rolls, nothing magical in it — but it’s nothing like it was, and for all its perks in other places Amaya’s body really wasn’t built for these sorts of shenanigans.

Her problem, that, or at least it should be.

Now, thanks to John Constantine, it’s Charlie’s too. And that’s just not fair.

Then again, after two bottles of Sara’s whisky, there’s not much that is fair.

Or unblurry, come to that.

Bloody hell, she hates this stupid body.

Hates being stuck. Hates being _mortal_.

Hates—

Everything, more or less. Plenty of hate to go around, frankly. And now, courtesy of the idiot warlock, she’s only got one very short, very human lifetime to deal with it all.

A short leash indeed, that.

Feels more like a damned noose.

But hey, at least Zari will be chuffed.

*

Turns out, Zari is not chuffed.

That might have something to do with the fact that it’s the middle of the night and Charlie’s just barged into her bedroom, hit the lights, and started talking to the wall.

Then again, maybe it’s just the way she is. Hard to say, really, with that stick so far up her—

“Charlie.”

Well, that’s a new one. Makes a nice change from ‘fugitive’, ‘monster’, or ‘not-bloody-Amaya’. Charlie tries it on for size, her name on Zari’s tongue, and finds that she doesn’t hate it.

“So,” she hums, “you do know my name, then.”

Zari lifts her head about a hair’s width off the pillow. “It’s three in the morning,” she grumbles, all rusted and fuzzy with sleep. “Go away.”

That’s new too. Keeping time on a time ship.

“How do you even know?” It’s a serious question, not at all snarky; if she’s going to be stuck in this flying nightmare, might as well get the basics down. “What are we on, Waverider Standard Time or something?”

Zari chucks the pillow at her. “Try ‘go away and leave me alone’ time.”

“Now, where’s the fun in that?” She catches the pillow, lobs it back without missing a beat. Still got it, she thinks, even with Amaya’s piss-poor tolerance. “Look, I’m just here because I thought you’d like to know—”

“You’re here because you’re drunk,” Zari says flatly.

Charlie’s actually a wee little bit offended at that. It’s not like she’s slurring or anything—

(Not _much_ , anyway.)

—and how would Princess Stick-Up-Her-Arse even know what sloshed looks like, anyway?

“What makes you say that?”

Zari actually laughs at that.

Bloody rude, frankly, but it’s still a step up from all that seething hatred. Charlie’ll take it.

“You reek worse than Rory,” Zari informs her, and—

Huh.

Charlie considers this for a long moment, then says, “Huh.”

“Go away,” Zari growls, “before I lock you back up again.”

“Your boss wouldn’t approve of that,” Charlie points out, rather proudly. “We have an agreement, the cap and me. No more bloody cages.”

“Under the proviso that you behave yourself.” She sits up fully now, glaring. “And this? This is _not_ behaving yourself.”

True enough, probably. At least by the standards of this ship and its crew of stick-up-the-arse goody-goodies. Just one more of the zillion reasons why Charlie hates it.

Bad idea, letting herself think about it. All of sudden her head feels light, like she can’t breathe properly. She feels suffocated, like there’s not enough air in the room.

Strangled too, a little bit. Like—

Like the choker around her neck is getting tighter. Like maybe it’s not just some cool, kinky fashion accessory she picked out and chose for herself but another kind of prison, the collar for the leash, a scrap of meaningless nothing that only gives her the illusion of freedom, of being allowed to choose free will, of—

Bloody _hell_.

She’s got her fingers hooked under it before she even realises she’s doing it. Tugging, yanking, clawing at the stupid thing, trying to get it loose, trying to make herself breathe. She feels ridiculous, humiliated, and Zari is staring at her like she’s lost her bleeding mind.

Maybe she has, at that.

“Is it hot in here,” she croaks, trying stupidly to save face, “or is it just you?”

Zari rolls her eyes. “Don’t you dare.”

If she’s trying to look disgusted, or even offended, she’s doing a piss-poor job of it. Still, for the sake of her modesty — and maybe a little bit because the booze is making it difficult to do facial expressions properly — Charlie refrains from smirking too hard.

“Look,” she says instead, sobering figuratively if not literally. “I’m just here to tell you there’s no worries on the whole ‘keep it on a leash’ thing. Already got myself one of those, cage or no cage, and I’m in no hurry to get another. So how about you go ahead and loosen yours a bit, yeah?”

 _Loosen up the rest of you too,_ she thinks privately, _while you’re at it_.

She’s smart enough, at least for now, not to say that last bit out loud.

Not that it stops Zari from staring like she’s just grown another head.

Which... yeah. Wouldn’t have minded if she had done that, honestly.

If she had, it’d mean she could still—

Yeah, no. Never gonna happen, that.

Worse than wishful thinking, honestly: it’s just flat-out depressing.

No second head, no third eye, no shapeshifting of any kind. No reason for the look at all, only apparently it’s Zari’s default gawking-at-the-fugitive look. Like she can’t figure out whether Charlie really did come here to talk or whether it’s just a front for knocking another piece out of her pretty little face.

Tempting to do it, too, what with the whole ‘leash’ rubbish. But she won’t.

She’s supposed to be on her best behaviour, after all. Whatever that means.

She thought it was obvious, the ‘why are you here’ explanation part, but apparently Zari’s one of those slow-on-the-uptake types. Or maybe just the type to see the worst in people, even without a reason.

Whatever. She can figure it out in her own time, that she’s got nothing to fear from the fugitive hell-monster, that Charlie’s toothless and harmless and neutered. Experience has taught her there’s not a damned thing she can say or do that’ll reassure someone who doesn’t want to be reassured.

If Zari doesn’t want to see the truth — the obvious truth, the truth that’s right bloody there in front of her perfect stupid face — there’s not a word out of Charlie’s mouth that’ll ever convince her she’s more than the monster she sees. She’ll either come around on her own or she won’t, but either way Charlie is through playing the good puppy just for a chance at the tiniest scrap of respect.

A chance at being treated like she’s—

‘Human’.

Heh.

Not much chance of that, she supposes, even if Zari does come around.

Because she’s not, is she? Never mind her present situation, never mind that they’ve stuffed her into the body of one; in their eyes she’ll never be anything like them. Caged or leashed or whatever other tortures they’ve got up their sleeves, they’re never going to see her as anything other than a magical creature, a shapeshifter, a fugitive from the hell dimension.

Never even going to try, are they? No matter what she does, no matter what she says, even if she really does try. So far as they’re concerned she’ll always be a monster.

She feels it cracking a bit, the arrogance and the don’t-give-a-rat’s-arse facade, and she hates herself because why does it have to be now, while the little bitch is finally looking at her, why can’t she just be _better_ at this?

Still staring, head cocked to one side like a bloody labrador, Zari says, “What are you talking about?”

Right. Probably shouldn’t have assumed they were both on the same page. Humans process stuff so bloody slowly, sometimes Charlie feels like she’s going backwards talking to them.

“Heard you talking with the cap.” She sounds a whole lot steadier than she feels, thank anything, all cool and indifferent and whatever. Score one for the booze. “Remember? Her being all ‘get used to it’ blah blah blah captain stuff, and you being all ‘I want it kept on a short leash’. Like it’s your bloody right to make demands.” 

And there it is: a crack in the coolness. But hell, at this point, who can blame her?

Zari, apparently. Head still cocked, eyes rolling like she’s trying to roll them clean out of her pretty head, she says, “And it’s _your_ right to tell me I can’t? At least I’m a member of the team!”

Charlie pouts, ignoring that with absolutely no dignity whatsoever. “Just figured it’d help you sleep better or whatnot,” she grumbles instead, sullen now, “knowing you don’t need to worry about it. I’m a good little magical creature, all obedient and docile and whatever. No bad behaviour, no need for your bloody leashes.”

Zari shakes her head, slack-jawed and gaping a little.

“You thought it’d help me sleep better,” she repeats, slow and stupid and so bloody human, “to get wasted and break into my quarters in the middle of the night?” She gawks some more. “That’s your definition of ‘no bad behaviour’?”

Well, when you put it that way...

Still, Charlie didn’t get where she is without learning a thing or two about rolling with the punches. “Exactly,” she says with a proud sort of flourish. “Good to know your lot can keep up once in a while.”

It doesn’t go over particularly well.

Shocking, right?

Zari throws up her hands, flops back onto her pillows, and says, in the voice of one not-so-idly considering first-degree murder, “You’re out of your mind.”

Probably, yeah. And sloshed to boot. Still, she’s here now, and she’s not about to back off just because the self-righteous do-gooder might have a point.

“I’m doing you a favour, here,” she grouches, folding her arms to punctuate her own point. “Might wanna think about showing a little spot of gratitude, yeah?”

“Right, right. My bad.” And she drops her voice probably a whole bleeding octave; she’s really leaning into the whole snarky-sarcastic thing, this one. “Thank you _so much_ , Charlie, for barging into my quarters in the middle of the night — uninvited, by the way — and yelling at me about a conversation I had with Sara once. Which, incidentally, you weren’t actually part of and shouldn’t have been eavesdropping in the first place.” She sits up, glares, then flops back down. “Seriously. Thank you _so_ much.”

Charlie smirks. “You’re welcome.”

“Great.” Zari sighs, already rolling over. “Now, if we’re done here, you can go ahead and crawl back into whatever hole you drank your way out of.” A hand rises from the mess of pillows and bedsheets, waving dismissal like a bloody princess sending some stupid serf off to be executed. “Kill the lights when you go, would you? And do feel free to let the door hit you on the way out.”

Bloody rude, that.

Charlie gives her the finger — unseen, natch, but it’s the principle of the thing — and spins on her heels. “You heard Her Majesty,” she mutters at the computer. “Kill the lights, yeah? Kill ’em bloody dead.”

And out they go.

And—

Well.

Thing is, Charlie is really not used to not being able to see in the dark.

She’s used to auto-shifting into something with night-vision, or else making some subtle little barely-thinking-about-it adjustment to the insides of her eyes. Simple stuff, that, practically instinct after the last few millenia, so much that she’s practically forgotten it’s a shapeshifter thing.

But it’s gone now too, along with everything else that made her _her_ , and apparently she’s still a bit off-balance from the way she whirled away from the bed — which, okay, not super-mature or super-smart after two bottles of booze, she’ll own that one — because the next thing she knows she’s flat on her face and there’s a great bleeding table on top of her.

“Bloody _hell_!”

And that’s loud enough to get Zari out of bed, and—

“Gideon, lights!”

And apparently they weren’t killed nearly dead enough, because suddenly they’re neon-bright, blaring right into Charlie’s confused, drunken, squinty little Amaya-shaped eyes, and oh, great, apparently now she can’t see in the light any more than she could see in the dark.

How is that even bloody _possible_?

Stupid useless mortal human body.

She squints up, makes out Zari’s silhouette in the haze of too much light and too much booze and too much spinning-swirling-everything. Finds a wobbly grin and tries, yet again, to save face.

“Enjoying the view, love?”

Zari shoves the table off her, then hauls her up onto her feet with strength enough to floor an ogre.

“What is _wrong_ with you?”

There are so many answers to that, Charlie actually feels a bit sick trying to process them all.

“Where do you want me to start?”

And isn’t it just her damned bad luck that she sounds exactly as sick and stupid as she feels?

She’s shooting for cocksure, all smugness and self-confidence, the stuff she knows gets right on Zari’s wick. It’s one of her favourite defence mechanisms, finding the right tone to piss off would-be challengers, knock them all off-centre before they even start, and she’s usually really good at it. Tried and true, and a whole lot of practice, right? But maybe she hit her head on the table or something, or maybe she’s just a whole lot drunker than she thought, because it comes out sort of shaky and unsteady and—

And, yeah, _sick_. Like she feels: all hot and cold and sweaty. And it’s okay, really; she can handle the feeling just fine, even if it is weird and stupid that she can’t just blink and shift it away—

But she’s not supposed to _sound_ that way too. It’s not supposed to get into her _voice_ , that stupid awful feeling, she’s not supposed to give herself away. Not here, not in front of bloody Zari, not—

And all of a sudden Zari isn’t glaring any more.

Charlie should feel triumphant about that — _gotcha, you tight-arsed wanker_ — but she doesn’t.

She just feels seen.

Nothing in the whole wide world more terrifying to a shapeshifter.

A shapeshifter who was imprisoned in _hell_.

Who was...

She reels away, spinning back to the door.

( _Because that turned out so well the last time,_ a voice snorts in her head, and she gives it the psychic finger.) 

The floor lurches as she moves, makes her stumble and sway, but she doesn’t fall and so she doesn’t care. Let the bitch see, let her think it’s all just the booze — and maybe some bit of it is, sure — let her think whatever the bloody hell she wants, so long as she doesn’t—

“Hey.”

—stop her, gripping her arms, dropping her voice again to a new kind of low, a different kind of low—

And it’s _soft_ , and it’s _wrong_ , and it’s _terrifying_ —

And Charlie tries to break free, all instinct and animal-wildness and yowls, “Get your mitts off me!”

And of course Zari just holds on tighter.

“You’re insane,” she says, wrestling her back down to the ground. “Seriously, you are _out_ of your _mind_.”

“Don’t have to tell me that.”

And that—

It’s not a yowl, it’s not a growl, it’s just _sad_.

And of course Zari ignores her.

“You’re out of your mind,” she says again, like Charlie didn’t already agree with her. “But Sara would kill me if I let you run around unsupervised in this condition, so...” She sighs, long and loud, hot breath on the side of Charlie’s neck that feels a whole lot nicer than it has any right to. “Get comfortable, I guess, because you’re not going anywhere.”

The words don’t match the look on her face, though. Even sloshed and maybe-sort-of panicking, Charlie can see that much. Angry words, sad face. It doesn’t make any kind of sense.

“What’s your angle?” she slurs, still struggling to break free. “You couldn’t wait to get rid of me ten seconds ago. Why do you suddenly care if I’m wreaking havoc or whatever else?”

Zari studies her for a beat. Like, really studies her, all deep and close, and _yikes_ , Charlie’s never going to get used to that. Not even after all these millenia, never going to get used to people looking right at her, looking right into her, even, without bursting into flames and dying a gruesome, horrible death.

And it’s even weirder now than usual, her being all stuck in this weak human body, knowing she’ll never get to show her real self again. Not on purpose, not by accident, not ever. There’s nothing left of who — _what_ — she was, just bitter memories of bygone eras and a few millenia of unending exhaustion.

Worse and worse, the exhaustion part, with every second she spends on this blasted ship.

“I don’t know how things work where you’re from,” Zari says, after a long beat, “but here on the Waverider, we actually take responsibility. For ourselves, and for others as well. If I let you go running off like this, knowing how much of a mess you are, I’d be culpable for whatever chaos you wreak.” She sneers, mocking and way prettier than anyone has the right to look when they’re being such an arse. “I bet you don’t even know what that word means.”

Charlie sneers right back. “Means ‘bloody boring’, don’t it?”

Zari’s sigh is... something.

Loud, mostly, and frustrated. But also kind of... _something_.

Makes Charlie’s teeth hurt.

Makes other parts of her hurt a bit too, or at least feel like they might be hurting. She’s still not used to being all stuck and fixed, not used to having to heed the demands of a single, static body. Real pain or just gas, who can even tell any more?

She feels like a newborn, stupid and helpless and confused.

But then she looks at Zari, sighing and shaking her head and trying just a little bit too hard to keep that _something_ hidden, and...

Yeah. That’s definitely hurt, that is.

She falls over when Zari lets go of her arms, flopping onto her side like a fish out of water — feels like one, too, all suffocating in the dry air and all that — and there she stays, watching the walls blur and swerve like she absolutely, totally planned it this way.

She didn’t, but hey. Who cares, right?

Above her, too close, Zari sighs again.

“Seriously,” she says, for about the thousandth time. “Why are you really here?”

“Told you,” Charlie grouches. “Wanted you to know—”

“Oh, knock it off.” Bloody hell, she can practically _hear_ the eye-roll. “What kind of idiot goes barging into someone’s quarters in the middle of the night just to admit they were eavesdropping on a conversation from, what, two days ago?”

“This kind, apparently.”

“Right. Stupid question.” Another sigh, and this one goes all the way through her, like a shudder or a thrill. “Let me put it another way: what, exactly, were you hoping to accomplish by coming in here and telling me... whatever the hell you’ve been trying to tell me?”

It’s a good question. Too good, frankly, for a confused, lobotomised, way-too-sloshed-for-this shapeshifter to even begin to answer.

“Thought it’d make you happy,” she says, slow but with proper honesty. “That’s all. Nothing insidious or whatever else you’ve got your knickers in a twist over. Just full-on thought it’d cheer you up. You’ve been in such a mood about them letting me out of the cage, you and that ‘keep it on a leash’ rubbish.” She tries to make her expression serious, but her face really isn’t co-operating. She decides to blame Amaya. “You could hurt a girl’s feelings, you know, throwing that stuff around.”

“You weren’t supposed to be listening!”

“Yeah, well, I was, weren’t I?” She’s not going to apologise for that, no matter how many angry-sad-weird looks Zari tosses her way. “Gotta know what I’m up against, yeah? Been burned by humans too many times to take any chances on you lot and your time-copper nonsense. Especially since you were so adamant about the whole ‘chucking me back into hell-prison without a fair bloody trial’ bit.”

She’s trying to glare again, but she has a nasty suspicion it’s not working. Zari’s still staring at her, but it’s the soft-sad- _something_ sort of stare now, not the exasperated-moody-annoyed one.

Charlie would really, _really_ prefer the latter right now, if she had a vote in the matter. At least she knows what she’s dealing with there: being a pain in the arse is kind of her _raison d’être_. The _something_ is too...

Well, if she knew that, it’d probably have a bloody name, wouldn’t it?

“Okay,” Zari says, slow and sort of pitchy-strange. “So. Let’s say I understand the eavesdropping part. Blatant rudeness aside, let’s say I get it. You don’t know where you stand with us, you want to make sure we’re not secretly plotting to throw you back into the hell-dimension. Believe it or not, that part, I do understand.”

Charlie snorts. Then hiccups. Only the former is intentional.

“I’ll bet you do, princess.”

Zari thins her lips. She doesn’t rise to the bait, but Charlie can tell the title hits a nerve. Fair enough; it was supposed to. Charlie’s not stupid; she knows a fellow fugitive when she sees one, and she knows better than most exactly what kind of insults would sting. Accusing someone of having everything laid out at their feet, knowing full bloody well that they’re used to having nothing...

Yeah, it’s supposed to sting. Such a shame that Zari doesn’t let it show.

“What I don’t get,” she presses instead, still tight-lipped but still infuriatingly controlled, “is why you care whether or not I’m happy.”

 _Ah_.

Charlie definitely doesn’t flush. And if she does, it’s absolutely the whisky’s fault. Or Amaya’s. Someone else’s, anyway, but definitely not hers.

“None of your bloody business,” she mutters.

“You’re sprawled on the floor in my quarters in the middle of the night,” Zari points out. “That’s kind of the definition of my business, shapeshifter.”

“ _Ex_ -shapeshifter,” Charlie blurts out, before she can stop herself.

Because yeah, that one stings too.

Zari’s eyes go wide, the derision and the _something_ coming together, sharpening and growing dangerous—

No, worse: perceptive.

“Huh.” A pause that lasts a second and also a century, and then: “Huh.”

Charlie grits her teeth, hissing a curse that she hopes the too-perceptive human won’t hear. “Just a bloody fact, innit?” she says sourly. “No need to make a song and dance of it.”

Her voice is sort of shaking again as she says it, though, and she knows Zari’ll hear it, knows she’ll probably see it too, the way it’s on her face, the way her stupid lips — _Amaya’s_ stupid lips — are shaking too, the way it’s getting harder and harder to keep herself together.

And not in the fun way, either. Not the way it used to be, breaking apart molecules and matter, the way she used to let herself fall apart and fall back together again just to feel it.

Those days are over now, aren’t they? Over and done, and ‘falling apart’ doesn’t mean literally any more, it means figuratively, it means shaking in her voice and shaking in her lips and her hands and her stupid mortal human body, this body that isn’t hers and should never have been hers.

And that, she knows, is a great big part of why Zari is looking at her like that, angry and upset and _something_ all at once. Because she is not this body, but she also really, really _is_.

“Oh,” Zari says again, and this time it’s only soft, only sweet, only _something_ , and there is so much of it, that soft-sweet- _something_ , that Charlie thinks it’s going to make her puke.

“Someone has to be,” she hears herself whisper, an answer to the question she’s sure Zari’s all but forgotten. “This whole stinking mess. Gotta be someone who’s happy about it, right? Or what’s the bloody point?”

Zari looks like she doesn’t understand, and also a bit like she understands much, much too well.

“I see,” she says, and it’s not really a reply, it’s not really anything, just two meaningless words.

Charlie swallows. She’s feeling right proper sick now, but she’s pretty sure it has nothing to do with the booze sloshing around in her — Amaya’s — belly. Too vivid for that, too visceral. Which means it’s about the other stuff, the stuff she can’t do nothing about. No use in letting that kind of sickness out: the problem will still be there when she’s finished. So she drives it back down and glares some more instead.

“You did this to me,” she growls. “You and your stupid time-copper mates. You put a leash around my neck, chained me to this worthless human body, and now I’m stuck, I’m mortal and I’m bloody _stuck_ , even without your stupid cage, and it’s not... it’s...” Her face is wet, but she doesn’t care; it’s not her face anyway. “You wanted me leashed, and here I am. If that’s not enough to make you happy, I don’t...”

 _I don’t know what else to do_ , she doesn’t say.

Doesn’t say it because she can’t say it, because saying it would mean admitting that maybe she would do something if she could, that maybe she wants to make these idiots happy, to find a place here for her new weakened self, to be a part of something and maybe _belong_ —

Stupid sentimental rubbish.

They hate her, don’t they?

And she should — does — hate them too.

So she doesn’t say it. 

Doesn’t say anything, just lets her stupid heart lie there on the floor next to Amaya’s stupid body and hopes that Zari will stomp all over them both.

They’re the ones who made her like this. They’re ones who _want_ her like this. All weak and mortal, human-passing but not really one of them. Lobotomised and broken up inside, pieces all torn out of what she is, remade in their image. Mortals playing at being gods, and didn’t they just happen to pick the world’s leading expert in that?

It’s the only way they’re ever happy around creatures like her. That’s a lesson millenia in the making, that is. They only like her kind when they’ve got them leashed and caged and—

 _Helpless_.

Helpless, weak, pathetic, just like them.

Remade in their bloody image, indeed.

Zari is looking a bit sick now too, staring at her all wide-eyed and pitying, like she’s seeing her now for the first time. Not the shapeshifting monster that stole her friend’s face, but Charlie, the immortal soul trapped inside a terrifying mortal body.

“Huh,” she says again, and it’s probably the most hollow sound Charlie has ever heard in her long, long life.

“You’ve taken everything,” she rasps, shaking her head. “So go on, then: tell me how bloody happy you are.”

Zari doesn’t tell her that. Doesn’t tell her anything, at least not right away. Charlie supposes she should have known better than to expect she would. The last little bit of solace these arseholes and idiots could give her, admitting they’re happy, and they won’t even do that. She doesn’t know why she let herself hope for anything different, why she was stupid enough to imagine, naive enough to hope, bloody idealistic enough to—

Ugh. Whatever.

One more thing to blame on the whisky.

And on Amaya’s piss-poor constitution.

Well. Her piss-poor constitution now, isn’t it? Can’t exactly blame some stuck-up bint she’s never even met. Doesn’t even really know how true-to-form she’s got her body down anyway. Just a guess, really based on photos and what she learned about her from ‘Rayge’. No way of knowing for sure without checking, and she kind of doubts Zari would be willing to put out and check out all the details herself in the name of ‘science’.

Charlie’ll need a whole lot more than two bottles to get up the guts to ask her for that, even if she is a tad curious.

She’s still shaking like a bloody leaf, just being here at all.

Middle of the bloody night and all. Sloshed and stupid and two hiccups away from ruining the upholstery.

Bet the princess would love her for that.

She’ll never know, though, because Zari has her by the arms again, hauling her upright for the however-many-th time. A mite gentler now, though, like she’s done trying to make a point, done trying to discipline her or corral her or whatever else she was shooting for, like she really is just trying to help her get her head back on straight.

Fat chance of that, Charlie thinks, but at least she’s not touching her like she’s scared of her any more. At least she’s not touching her like she wants to shower in disinfectant or something the instant she lets her go.

“I’m not happy,” Zari says at long last, very quietly. “Honestly, I just feel sorry for you.”

Charlie laughs, then hiccups, then laughs again to cover up the discomfort.

“Well, then,” she says, turning to scowl sullenly at the wall, “cheers for bloody nothing.”

She tries to break free, tries to turn back to the door, but Zari holds her fast.

“You’re not going anywhere,” she says, all firm and commanding, and if they were in bed and Charlie wasn’t feeling so bloody sorry for herself she might find the whole rigid-authority thing a bit sexy. “You’re going to sleep off whatever it is you drank, right here, where I can keep an eye on you.”

Charlie pouts. “And if I refuse?”

Zari’s shrug is entirely too smug. It’s like she gets off on antagonising her, like she thinks it’s fun to make Charlie’s blood boil and her head throb, like she thinks it’s so damn clever to—

Well. At least it keeps her from thinking about the darker stuff.

And maybe that’s part of her plan, because there’s a weird kind of self-satisfaction in the way she holds up a small, ridiculous fist and says, “We can always do it the old-fashioned way.”

Charlie laughs again.

Proper laughs this time. None of the booze-fuelled bravado, none of the pains in her chest or shivers in her bones, no hiccups or swearing or any of that other stuff that keeps rocking her useless body. None of the weak stuff, the human stuff, the _Amaya_ stuff. Just laughter, pure and simple and real, loud and open and all hers, and it goes on for way, way, way longer than it should.

Zari’s smiling when she pulls herself together. Only a little bit, mind, but even so. “Are you quite done?”

It’s no effort at all, then, to find a bit of her old swagger, cocky and arrogant and pure undiluted Charlie.

“Not by a long shot,” she says, and grins like her life depends on it.

*

She sleeps the sleep of the dead and dead-drunk.

For about an hour, anyway.

Then she wakes, bolting back to consciousness, hurled into the void by some illusive demon or another, dazed and dizzy and confused, with no idea where she is or how the hell she got there.

It’s dark.

It’s pitch-bloody-dark, and she can’t see a damn thing. Can’t see, can’t move, can’t even breathe, and when she tries to use her powers, to shift into something that can — any one of those things, see or move or breathe, she doesn’t even care which, just something, please, _something_ — nothing happens at all. She’s stuck, pinned down with a dead weight thrown over her body, holding her in place, keeping her trapped, keeping her _bound_ — 

She doesn’t understand what’s happening. She doesn’t understand anything, only that she can’t see and she can’t move and she can’t breathe and she can’t she can’t she can’t—

She screams.

Can’t do nothing else, can’t even try to think, so she just opens her mouth and screams like the banshee she’d gladly shift into if she could, screams like some demonic monstrous hell-thing, like the creatures she’s so sure can hear breathing in the dark, the monsters who share her prison, her nightmare, her hell, this awful, horrible—

“Hey!”

A slap.

It shakes her body, juddering through her with real violence, but still just a slap. Nothing else, nothing violent or brutal, no torture or torment or terror. None of the countless big and small traumas she’s come to expect from moments like these: no hellfire, no boiling blood, no bones turning to dust and ashes inside her. Rough, sure, but that’s all it is — simple, normal, _mortal_ — and the impossible simplicity of it brings her back to herself.

Enough to stop screaming, at least.

She’s still shaking, though. Skinny human body drenched in sweat, and it feels wrong, the body, ill-fitted and much, much too tight; she wants to rip it off but it’s all over her, all around her, the skin and the bones and the blood, it’s all that’s left of her, it’s her, it’s her, it’s _her_ —

“What did you do to me?” she howls, and the voice isn’t hers either, only the words, the panic, the pain, the fear.

No response. Just a sigh, low and weary in the darkness, and then—

“Gideon, lights.”

—and then Charlie’s vision is flooded with neon white, a different kind of blindness but somehow one much less terrifying.

It’s not hell, she realises with a flood of emotion so profound she couldn’t say what it is.

It’s not hell, it’s not prison, it’s not the waking nightmare she suffered through for all those lifetimes. It’s just a room — Zari’s room, she remembers vaguely, on the blasted Waverider — and there are no monsters, no horrors, no nightmares except the ones still stuck in her head. It’s safe here, or so the idiot time-coppers keep telling her, and the only thing missing, the only thing that’s wrong is _her_.

They made her mortal. Made her human, or as close to it as a freak like her can ever get. That’s why she can’t see, why she can’t shift, why her body feels too tight and too wrong: because it’s not hers, was never meant to be hers. Because it’s not a body at all, just a new kind of cage.

How could she forget?

She squints into the neon light, finds Zari gawking at her with sleep-tinged confusion. “What the hell was that about?”

Charlie coughs. She feels like she’s burning up on the inside, like Zari would if she ever got to see her real face, if that was even a possibility any more.

“Just a dream,” she says, testing the truth of it on her tongue. “Nothing to worry your pretty little head about, princess.”

Zari ignores the barb this time. “You scared me half to death!”

 _You’re not the only one,_ Charlie thinks, but she keeps that to herself. If she admits even the smallest piece of what she’s feeling — the horror of waking up disoriented and forgetting, not knowing where or what she is, unable to fathom anything beyond the simplest, most basic emotion: terror — she knows that her useless not-shifter body will betray her again. It will shudder, shake, sweat, and she won’t be able to stop herself from screaming again, from shouting and yelling and carrying on—

Or, worse, from bursting into bloody tears.

“That’s your problem,” she manages, failing abysmally in her attempt to sound cool. “Not mine. I wanted to piss off back to the parlour, remember? You’re the one who made me stick around to warm your stupid bed.”

“That’s not why I’m keeping you here,” Zari splutters, so offended it’s almost like she’s not actually offended at all.

“Whatever, love.” Charlie waves a hand, then realises it’s shaking and quickly shoves it behind her back. “Point is, you’re the monster hunter, innit? Should’ve figured you’d get bitten if you tried to cuddle one.”

Zari actually chokes at that. “I was _not_...” She flushes, hot and hyper-defensive. “I don’t cuddle monsters.”

“Course not.” There’s a jagged pitch to the words, though, a crack that runs through the bravado and makes her sound exactly as vulnerable and terrified as she still maybe is. Worse than the shaking of her hand by far, because she can’t hide her stupid voice behind her back or under the sheets. “So someone else was pinning me down when I woke up, then?”

“I...” The flush shifts a little, like a rainbow of emotion cascading across her face. It’s kind of pretty, or it would be if Charlie were capable of seeing things properly right now. “No.”

“Right.” She pinches the bridge of her nose, pretends she’s not trying with everything she has in her just to catch her stupid mortal breath. “Fancy throwing an apology my way, then?”

She’s trying a little too hard to be abrasive, and it probably shows. Playing up the moodiness, all sullen and sulky, grumbling brattishly about the invasion of privacy or whatever other stupid human bullshit she might be able to slide past someone as prudish as Zari. Making out like it’s all some stupid game, but she can tell it’s not working. 

Truth is, she doesn’t give a damn about being cuddled or snuggled or whatever else some human does in her sleep. She’s woken up from a whole lot worse, hasn’t she? Woken up to real monsters, real demons, real bloody horrors, more times than any mortal will ever be able to count. Woken up to literal bloody hell, hasn’t she, and she’s still here, she’s still—

Okay, so maybe that’s the problem. 

Gotta be, right? Because it’s not the cuddling bit that gets her, it’s the being-pinned-down bit. The awful horrible no-good feeling that comes with waking up under some other sucker’s body shoving hers down, the solidity of it, the strength even in someone as slight as Zari is. Doesn’t need to be strong, just needs to be _there_ , holding her down, keeping her in place, trapped and smothered and—

Helpless.

Because she is now, isn’t she? Human, mortal, and totally bloody helpless. Can’t shift, can’t see in the too-dark or the too-light, can’t tell the difference between a sleeping, snuggly-cuddly human bedmate and a hell-prison full of monsters set on making breakfast out of her insides. Can’t even remember where she is when she wakes up wasted in the dead of night, or what kind of creature she’s meant to be.

Don’t get more helpless than that.

She pulls her knees up to her chest, uses the shift in position to inch herself away from Zari. Needs the space to breathe, or to try and breathe, if her stupid body is even capable of it. Needs it, too, in case she has to run.

She always has to run eventually, doesn’t she?

Maybe seeing some of that — or hell, maybe just glad to be shot of her — Zari lets her go without complaint.

“Fine,” she says after a beat, looking good and sulky about it. “Sorry. I’m not used to having other people in my bed. I guess maybe I’m a sleep-cuddler.”

Charlie smirks, and hopes to hell it doesn’t look as quivery as it feels.

“All the more reason for you to let me out of this hole you call a bedroom,” she says, too quick and too fake-easy. “Let me sleep it off in the parlour or the lab or wherever else.”

 _Away from you,_ she means. _Away from humans who’ll pin me down while I’m sleeping, who’ll make me feel even more helpless than I already am, who’ll leash me and cage me and make me—_

Her gulp, audible and horrible, probably gives Zari all the ammo she needs to keep her here.

“You’re still drunk,” she points out, with the haughty faux-authoritative smirk of one’s who’s just had their point well and truly made.

Which... sure, okay. True enough, so Charlie’s flayed senses tell her.

She’d never allow any of this rubbish if she was sober. If she had her head on straight — her new forever-head, her here-for-the-rest-of-her-tiny-mortal-life head, her stupid Amaya-head — she’d never let so much of her fear show in front of someone else. Definitely not in front of a human; they’re the reason she’s feeling this way in the first place, and this one more than most.

Zari and her leashes, Zari and her self-righteousness, Zari and the way she keeps bloody staring, like she doesn’t know if she’s looking at the kind of monster who needs to be put down or the kind that needs a hug.

Charlie really, really doesn’t want a hug.

She just wants a decent night’s sleep. Real sleep, proper sleep, the kind of sleep that only comes when you feel safe.

She didn’t sleep for years in the prison dimension. Dozed sometimes, and that was bad enough. Couldn’t afford to shut her eyes for any longer. Couldn’t afford to—

No.

None of that. Not here, not now, and not in front of Zari.

She’d only just started to get used to it again, the proper-sleeping thing. Being safe enough to close her eyes, being able to sleep without fear, being able to sleep at all.

And now _this_.

Who needs bloody nightmares when you’re living one?

She grips her knees a little tighter.

“If you’re still staring at me like that,” she says to Zari, clenching her jaw to keep the words tight, keep them strong, keep them everything she’s not, “I’d say I’m not drunk enough.”

Zari doesn’t stop staring. But she doesn’t try to counter either, so Charlie considers it a win.

Not much of one, or at least not enough of one. It doesn’t take the sting out, even a little bit.

Charlie hates feeling like this. Exposed, all open and on display, her guts and bones hanging out for anyone to see. She hates this feeling of being stuck, unable to escape, or run or make herself into something else. She hates _feeling_ , all the weird and mortal ways that ‘feeling’ means permanence now, that it means something she can’t just shift her way out of.

She hates it. And Zari’s still right there bloody staring at her like she’s some kind of sideshow freak. And it’s such a tiny little step — and she knows this, she’s got the scars to bloody prove it — from harmless-sideshow-freak to dangerous-nightmare-monster, from ‘keep it on a leash’ to ‘send it back to hell’, and she doesn’t want to be here when that happens.

Can’t afford to be here.

Can’t afford to—

“Hey.”

Again, that stupid word, but different now. She’s not shouting it now, not startled by a screaming, deranged ex-shapeshifter caught in the hell between dreaming and waking; she’s saying it sort of like a question, like she’s asking for permission to say more. Like maybe there’s a part of her that sees Charlie as a person, or at least enough of one to be worth asking, to be spoken _to_ and not just _at_ , to be seen and heard and—

Bloody hell, that’s terrifying.

Can’t even say why; it just is.

Still, though, she rises to the bait. She stares right back, all crumbling bravado, and says, “Out with it, then.”

There she goes, blushing again. Stammering now, too, like she doesn’t rightly know what she’d meant to say.

Zari sighs. “Do you want some something to drink?” she asks, right out of nowhere. “Some coffee, maybe?”

Charlie tries to laugh, but her throat’s too dry; it comes out like she’s coughing, like she’s choking, like maybe she doesn’t really want to laugh at all. Like maybe she’d be crying if she weren’t so bloody dehydrated, or so ashamed.

“You know I’ll never get any sleep if you start chucking caffeine at me,” she points out. “Fragile human body, remember?”

Zari tilts her shoulder, acknowledging. “I don’t think we’ll be getting much more sleep tonight anyway,” she says. “You thrash around too much, and apparently I can’t be trusted not to...”

She coughs.

Charlie, smirking for the first time with sincerity, can’t help herself: “...not to cuddle me dead?”

Zari glares.

Well earned, that glare, and Charlie feels weirdly proud of herself for it. It’s easier to digest, the glaring and the scowling and the under-the-breath muttering, and it settles comfortably in her Amaya-belly. She’s used to that sort of stuff, not just from the arsehole humans who sent her to prison but from the normal ones too, the stuck-up wankers of the seventies who hated her for simple, stupid human reasons, the way she dressed or the people she shagged or the way she flashed too much skin up there on the stage.

The heat of their glares, the weight of their judgement, their self-righteous righteousness. It fed her, that did; she’d take it all in, swallow it all down, then spit it right back in their faces.

That was freedom, right there. Didn’t even need to shift to feel it.

She wonders if she ever will again. If she’d take it for granted the way she did before, just let it pass her by like some fleeting moment that doesn’t matter, if she’d ever again be so blind, so arrogant, so—

All of a sudden, she’s not smirking any more, and Zari’s not glaring either. She’s reaching for her, fingertips trembling just a little, and her eyes have gotten all soft-sweet- _something_ again, and it hurts, it—

“You’re crying,” she whispers.

And Charlie hisses a hundred curses under her breath because the wench is right, she is bloody crying, her face is wet and her eyes are burning, and how, how, _how_ does this body have more power than the ageless, timeless, immortal soul stuck inside it?

It’s not fair.

It’s not—

“I’m _not_ ,” she snaps, swiping furiously at her face. “Just allergies, yeah? All that bloody...” She looks around, floundering stupidly for a scapegoat. “...flannel.”

Zari is — understandably — not impressed. “Seriously?”

“Yeah. We need to get you a proper wardrobe, princess.”

“Call me that again.” Her expression darkens again. She’s shooting real hard for the ice-bitch thing, but it’s about as transparent as Charlie’s piss-poor ‘allergies’ excuse. “I dare you.”

It’s bait, for sure, but why not take it? Better a fishhook stuck in her face than all this wallowing, right?

So, yeah, Charlie leans all the way into it, playing up the smugness, the attitude she knows Zari hates, all the stuff that hides the salt-tracks stubbornly clinging to her cheeks. “Prin _cess_.”

She wants it to escalate. Like, really wants it. She wants Zari’s little fist making a dent in her face, she wants the vertigo, the blooming, bruising burst of pain, the moment when she tries to shift it away and then can’t. She wants to feel it, all of it, everything; she wants the reminder painted all over her skin, her stupid Amaya-body, human and mortal and aching and sore and weak. She wants the pain to be physical, like the dizziness from the booze, like the headache from not getting enough sleep; she wants Zari to look her in the eye and lash out, good and hard and violent, and tell her with her fists that she bloody deserves this.

All of it.

She doesn’t, though. 

A shame, but then Charlie supposes she never really expected her to: Zari has more bravado than she does by far. Charlie at least follows through once in a while; Zari’s all noise and no teeth. Even if she really wanted it, she’d never stoop to Charlie’s level, gutter-filthy and animal, by throwing a proper punch.

A shame, yeah. Charlie could really do with some gutter-filthy animal violence right about now.

An excuse to hit back. Maybe just an excuse to self-flagellate a little, convince herself it’s her ‘just reward’ for being what she is—

What she was.

What she—

Whatever.

She wants the pain, the real pain, the someone-else’s-knuckles-in-her-mouth pain. Make it hurt less, in a twisted sort of way, by making her hurt more.

Zari doesn’t let it happen, though. Maybe she’s onto her, maybe she just really gets off on the whole ‘moral high ground’ thing. Either way, she’s insufferable when she gets all soft again, when the ice-bitch look falls from her face and the other thing comes back.

“Stop trying to push my buttons,” she says.

Charlie musters a leer. “Oh, I’ll push your buttons, prin—”

“Knock it off.” She’s serious now, like angry-serious but not angry-at-Charlie serious. It’s weird, and ten flavours of unsettling. “You don’t need to pretend, you know. ‘Allergies’. I mean, really?” She scoffs, and somehow that hurts worse than her fist would have. “Why can’t you just admit you’re having a moment?”

“Because I’m not. Because I’m...” But her voice gives her away, cracking and shuddering before she even has a chance to rein it in, and she hates it, hates it, hates it. “Because it’s not bloody _safe_ , that’s why!”

And there it is, out there on the cold middle-of-the-night air, here in this place where she is definitely, definitely not safe, and she can’t take it back. Can’t pretend she was just channelling Amaya, can’t pretend she’s still drunk and dreaming of hell, can’t pretend anything at all. She said it, and Zari heard it, and she’s staring at her because she heard it, because she maybe understands it too, and Charlie wants so badly to shift into something small, something that can hide, only she can’t, she can’t, she—

She is so, so unsafe.

Zari isn’t really looking into her any more. She’s sort of looking past her, sort of looking through her, and Charlie wonders if she’s maybe seeing a little piece of herself now, the angry, prejudiced human with a stick up her arse, the one who insists on caging every monster she doesn’t understand, who would happily put a leash on someone just for pissing her off.

Charlie is never going to stop pissing people off. It’s kind of what she does.

Maybe Zari gets that, or maybe she doesn’t. But there’s something like proper remorse in her voice when she speaks — “Oh,” again, for what’s probably the thousandth time — and she’s careful to not look too closely at Charlie’s salt-wet face when she says it.

Charlie doesn’t look at hers either. She looks down at her knees, pressed to Amaya’s chest, and she breathes proper slow, she and says, “My life’s in your hands. You know that?”

Zari says, real quiet-like, “Yeah.”

It doesn’t feel like the triumph it should be. Charlie sighs, and spits, “You and your time-copper mates, you’ve got me by the nethers.” She takes no pride in Zari’s hot flush, though she knows she should; it stings too deep, and the words are too real. “If even one of you chuckleheads decides I’m not useful enough, or thinks I’ve overstayed my welcome... hell, if you think I’ve had more than my share of the bloody breakfast cereal, it’s straight back to hell-prison. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred quid.”

She doesn’t mention the other part, the helplessness part, the part where her powers are gone and so too is her only ticket to survival. No powers, no means of protection; the first monster who got a sniff of her, and she’ll be his bloody breakfast cereal.

That part still makes her feel sick with fear. But it’s not Zari’s fault, no more than it’s Zari’s fault she was in the hell dimension in the first place. Charlie’s not above taking a few cheap shots if it’ll make her feel better or make Zari feel worse, but she kind of gets the vibe it’s not needed here. Zari might have her issues, but at least she’s self-aware enough to look a little bit abashed.

“That won’t happen,” she says, after a beat. “If we really wanted to send you back there, we would’ve done it already. We’re not going to do it now.”

“Sure you’re not.” She doesn’t even need to play up the derision this time; it’s thicker than treacle on her tongue, and just as hard to talk through. “All safe and sound and ‘we’re the good guys’, innit? Right up until I piss you off one time too many.” She knows; she’s been there before. “There’s always a line with you humans. The second I cross it, all bets are off.”

“No.”

Sentimental imbecile, she actually sounds like she means it Charlie snorts, and tries to convince herself it doesn’t sound like the whimper it maybe kind of wants to be.

“You wanted me on a bloody _leash_ , princess. You expect me to believe you wouldn’t fling me through the nearest portal just as quick if I caught you on a crappy day?”

Zari is quiet for a moment, sort of thoughtful. It’s a good look on her, chewing her lip and staring off into the middle distance like she’s halfway forgotten who she’s talking to. Charlie takes no shame in admiring her a little, if only to distract herself from other thoughts, the ones that may or may not be crying-adjacent, the ones that are really, really _not_ ‘allergy’-adjacent.

“Look,” Zari says at last. “You know I’m not thrilled to have you on board. I’ve never made a secret of that, and I’m not going to insult your intelligence by pretending I want to play nice with you. But I’m not the heartless slayer of magical creatures you seem to think I am, either. Honestly, you’re a difficult person to _not_ want to fling through the nearest portal.”

And that, Charlie thinks, is exactly the bloody problem. “So what’s stopping you? Put me out of my misery already.”

“Because we don’t do that here.” She’s exasperated now, frustration deepening her voice, like this is all so bleeding obvious. “I know it’s hard for you to believe, Charlie, but it _is_ possible to find you annoying as hell without also wanting to condemn you to another ten lifetimes in a hell dimension.” She draws herself up, all haughty and smug again; Charlie really wants to punch her in that too-pretty face of hers, but she also kind of wants to do other things to it now too. “It’s called being well-adjusted.”

“You lot?” She doesn’t even try to smile. “Don’t make laugh.”

“Laugh all you want,” Zari counters coolly. “It’ll still be true.”

Charlie does laugh, then. High and long and really, really forced, but what else can she do? It’s that or bloody cry, and they’ve already established that doesn’t go over well for either one of them.

“I don’t need you to like me,” she says. “Hate me if you like. Call me ‘fake-Amaya’ like your weird pyro-mate does. Say what you like, think what you like, I don’t bloody care. Just don’t...”

She doesn’t finish. Her stupid traitorous eyes are stinging again, and that can only mean—

“Hey.”

Bloody hell, she’s starting to hate that word. “Shut up.”

Zari does not. Instead, she shuffles closer, closer, too—

Too bloody close. Charlie wants to stop her, but she doesn’t, and she doesn’t know why.

“It’s not going to happen,” Zari says again, soft and sort of syrupy. “You don’t have to believe it right away. But as long as you stay out of trouble, you’ll have a place here. Okay?”

Charlie chews on her tongue. Has to, needs to: the dull, gnawing pain is the only thing standing between her and more stupid tears.

“And what happens when I don’t ‘stay out of trouble’?” she demands, because they both know it’s not going to happen, they both know it can’t, she can’t, it’s not bloody possible. “When your precious captain finds all them empty bottles, or when ‘Rayge’ finds the books I ripped all them pages out of, or—”

“You did _what_?”

“They were stupid books.” She’s definitely not bristling, and she’s definitely not embarrassed. “Don’t change the subject. Answer the bloody question: what happens when I cross one of your lines? You know it’ll happen eventually.”

Zari sighs. Charlie’s getting used to that now. Enough that the sound is actually more comforting than annoying. Shouldn’t be, but there it is: it means she knows where she stands with her. Where they stand, maybe, with each other.

Weird bloody thought, that. But there it is, and Zari’s still way closer than she should be and Charlie’s still not telling her to shove it.

Daft. Stupid and sentimental; she really ought to know better. But hey, maybe she shifted some of Amaya’s brains into her noggin as well as her chiselled cheekbones.

“Look,” Zari says. “There is a place here for you if you want it. If you’re willing to sand down that attitude of yours. It’s a good ship, and they— _we’re_ good people.” 

She levels her with what she no doubt assumes is a serious, disciplining sort of look. Charlie snorts. “Yeah, right.”

Zari ignores her. “If you don’t like it here, that’s fine. We’ll find some other place for you, somewhere you can’t hurt anyone.” Doesn’t say anything about ‘anyone’ hurting _her_ , Charlie notes. She keeps her trap shut on that point, though, giving Zari the benefit of the doubt as she goes on: “But whatever you do, whatever stupid, brainless crap you pull, we’re not sending you back to hell.”

“Right. Because _that’s_ where you draw the line?”

“Yeah, actually, it is.” She wrinkles her nose; Charlie can’t quite tell whether it’s her stupid Amaya-face that’s bothering her or the lingering reek of booze. “Especially while you’re looking like _that_.”

Charlie laughs. It’s a bit shakier than she’d like, but it’s real enough and it feels pretty damn good. “Scare off any monster that catches sight of me in this bloody state, yeah?”

“Yeah.” Zari’s laughter is a mirror of hers: a little wobbly, but honest. “Wouldn’t be fair on them, setting you loose back in there. Assuming they’d even take you back in the first place.”

Charlie snorts. “I’m a _prize_.”

“You’re a prize all right.” More nose-wrinkling; this time, the derision is kind of endearing, not that Charlie would ever admit it. “Point is, it’s best for everyone if you stick around. We get whatever intel you have on any other magical creatures we run into, and you get...”

“...cuddled to death?”

Zari’s smile fades, but only a tiny little bit . Definitely a win, Charlie thinks. Or as much of one as she’ll likely ever get from this crew of stiffs with sticks up their arses.

She’ll take it, she thinks. At least for now.

“Stick around,” Zari says again, and there’s a weird sort of edge to her voice now, different and sort of soft. Like maybe—

Like maybe she doesn’t mean it as a threat.

Huh.

Charlie sits with that a moment. Looks around this wreck of a room, this dive, this hole, this nothing space with its bad lights and bad fashion sense, this crappy corner of a crappy ship, this private room that Zari calls her own.

Sits with it proper, even: actually takes the time to look around and take it all in, all slow and careful and attentive-like. Takes in the colour of the bedsheets, the little trinkets strewn about the place — probably would’ve been on the table, she supposes, if she hadn’t sent the bleeding thing flying — and all the other myriad pieces of this arrogant, self-righteous prison-guard copper she barely knows.

She could get to know her a whole lot better, she suspects, just by being in here. Just by stopping all the blah-blah-blah talky rubbish and taking a look around.

Maybe that’s what she really means. ‘Stick around’, not just here but _here_.

It’s a weird feeling, the queasiness that settles in her gut. Like maybe it’s not actually queasiness at all, like maybe it’s more like anticipation, a kind of hope.

Stupid, that.

Still, there’s a tremor in her voice she can’t swallow down when she says, “No more cages?”

And just like that, the smile is back. “No more cages.”

Charlie swallows. The knot in her belly loosens ever so slightly. “No bloody leashes, either?”

“No leashes. I’ll talk to Sara in the morning, if you like.”

Charlie doesn’t know why the thought of that makes her feel sick all over again, but there’s a weird kind of urgency in the way she shakes her head.

“Yeah, maybe don’t do that. Wouldn’t want the cap getting wind of this little incident, you know? I’m supposed to be making a ‘good impression’ or whatever, and I don’t think ‘sloshed middle-of-the-night confessions’ would cut it.”

Zari laughs. It’s a very, very different sound to Charlie’s laugh, maybe because it’s not so forced.

“You’d be surprised,” she says, glowing with amusement and something that’s maybe a little bit fond, “what counts as a ‘good impression’ on this ship.”

All things considered, that’s probably the most promising thing Charlie’s heard since she got here.

“Well then,” she says. “All right.”

She doesn’t really know what she’s trying to say with that, but Zari seems to get it. Her smile widens a bit, then gets sort of delicate, and she shuffles back up onto her precious pillows.

“Come on,” she says, patting the vacant space beside her. “Only a few hours left before morning. Might as well try and get a bit more sleep.”

Charlie gets the feeling she’s talking about something a bit deeper. Like sleep is a metaphor, probably for the whole ‘sticking around’ thing. Like the whole bloody night is a metaphor.

Charlie hates metaphors. They make her head hurt.

Or maybe that’s the booze, roiling and getting all sick-sour inside of her.

Could possibly be both, for all she bloody knows.

Somewhere between Sara’s whisky and Zari’s words, the knot in her stomach and the throbbing in her head, metaphors and muddy thoughts and mementos knocked off someone else’s table. The dozens of silly little ways her body doesn’t really understand itself, all the little triggers from the world around her, massive neon lights that say _‘you are safe, idiot, even in that weak, useless, human body’_ , only she’s too bloody green to read them.

“Ugh,” she says (rather eloquently, she thinks).

Zari holds out her hand. Still, steady, strong even in the dead of night. Unflinching and unafraid, even when inviting a monster into her bed. “In or out, shapeshifter?”

Charlie shows her teeth. It’s automatic, reflexive, and she has a sneaking suspicion Zari knew it would be. Made the challenge on purpose, just to get a rise out of her.

Well, two can play that game.

She ramps up her leer. Makes it glow, makes it count, makes it hers, and says, without a tremor or a thought, “In.”

—


End file.
